The Himalayas present a grand spectacle when seen from the south. No other mountain region in the world can vie with it in awe-inspiring beauty. If we travel by rail from Calcutta up to Sikkim we see the snow-clad crest of the Himalayas in front and above us, and Kinchinjunga like a dazzling white pinnacle surmounting the whole. We see the sharply defined snow limit, and the steep, wooded slopes below. If it is early in the morning and the weather is fine, the jagged, snowy crest shines brightly in the sun, while the flanks and valleys are still hidden in dense shadow. And during the journey to the great heights we shall notice that the flora changes much in the same way as it does from South Italy to the North Cape. The last forms of vegetation to contend against the cold are mosses and lichens. Then we come to the snow limit, where the mountains and rocks are bare. North and Central Tibet have a mean elevation of 16,000 feet; that is to say, one is almost always at a greater height than the summit of Mont Blanc. Where the plateau country is so exceedingly high the mountain ranges seem quite insignificant. We have spoken of five great ranges, but between these He many smaller, all running east and west. What a fortunate thing it is for the people of Asia that the interior of the continent rises into the tremendous boss called Tibet! Against its heights the water vapour of the monsoon is cooled and condensed, so that it falls in the form of rain and feeds the great rivers. Were the country flat like northern India or Eastern Turkestan, immense tracts of the interior of Asia would be complete desert, as in the interior of Arabia; but as it is, the water is collected in the mountains and runs off in all directions. Along the rivers the population is densest; around them spring up cities and states, and from them canals branch off to water fields and gardens. You know, of course, that Asia is the largest division of land in the world, and that Europe is little more than a peninsula jutting out westwards from the trunk of Asia. Indeed, Asia is not much smaller than Europe, Africa, and Australia put together. Of the 1550 millions of men who inhabit the world, 830 millions, or more than half, live in Asia. If, now, you take out your atlas and compare southern Europe and southern Asia, you will find some very curious similarities. From both these continents three large peninsulas point southwards. The Iberian Peninsula, consisting of Spain and Portugal, corresponds to the Arabian Peninsula, both being quadrangular and massive. Italy corresponds to the Indian Peninsula, both having large islands near their extremities, Sicily and Ceylon. The Balkan Peninsula corresponds to Further India (the Malay Peninsula), both having irregular, deeply indented coasts with a world of islands to the south-east, the Archipelago and the Sunda Islands.